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It's Fun to Play the Piano ... Please Pass It On!

Hello pianofriends! I promised you some weeks ago to report back about my testing for a new grand piano to my studio in Norway. Well, here is my report:

We have tested and recorded four grands; Yamaha S6, C.Bechstein B212, Bosendorfer 214 and Shigeru Kawai 212. We have also played on the Yamaha C7, Schimmel K213 and S&SB211 (but we found it unnecessary record these grands). We used a Zoom H4 and two Neumann KM 184 microphones in the recordings.

Our conclusions? The new C.Bechstein B212 stands in a class above the others! No doubt about that. It sounds very very warm and beautiful, the voicing is incredible and it has a power and length in the tones that none of the others can reach.

Big words? Yes, to say this may be big words, but I recommend you all to go and try for yourselves. I’ll think this grand must be the best grand in its class in the world. It is very very perfect for acoustic jazz- and classical recordings!

Sounds like you've been having a lot of fun! Any chance you can upload those recordings so we can all hear them? We love a 'guess the piano' thread around here.

And I must say I respectfully disagree with your opinion about the C. Bechstein. I made a similar evaluation and decided that the Bosie 214 was the best in its class overall. But that's what's great about the tier 1 pianos: each one will speak to each of us differently. I'm glad you found one that speaks to you in such a special way.

Oh, and please do post some pictures when the piano arrives! If we love anything more than a guess the piano thread, it's a delivery thread with photos!

Congratulations, and may the C. Bechstein continue to wow you over the years.

The usual way is to post the pictures on a separate thread here. Instructions for doing this have been given numerous times so just do a search on "posting pictures". As for recordings, the usual thing is to get some free space at box.com, upload the MP3s there and post a link here. If anyone would like to add details on how to do either of these things please do.

If you go to these places you can download the grand piano recordings but remember; 1. The recordings are done on a Zoom H4 with the quality that it gives. 2. The trakcs are normalized so they all peak on 0.3dB.

BTW, I fell in love with playing the Pathetique Adagio since High School.

I use AUDACITY (free from the internet) to do edits (from Zoom H4) and change from the large wav files to mp3's. Then save them to a file in my music folder. You could then upload them from there for us to view.

I hope this helps.

LL

_________________________
"Music gives a soul to the universe, wings to the mind, flight to the imagination, and life to everything."

To be honest, I listened again today on a different set of speakers while I was converting the files, and while I stand by my guesses, I was far less certain of them this time. I'm still almost positive that #1 is the bosie though. If I were get that one wrong, it'd be pretty bad.

Now, for a little on my rationale, while we wait for some other guesses:For the record, I have played all of these pianos except the S6, but I have played C6 and C7 yamahas.I liked the recorded sound of #4 the best, and since Tom picked the Bechstein for how it sounded on the recording, I thought this one was it. I thought it had the nicest mix of bright attack and warm sustain. #3 sounded the brightest and the thinnest, so I guessed yamaha----perhaps my preconceived notions of the brand will come back to haunt me on this one? And #2 sounded most similar to #3 to me, but warmer and mellower, so I went with the shigeru kawai.

I did not choose the Bechstein only from the sound on the recordings. This grand was the one that was my number one after been playing on them too. But after hearing the four tracks you just have heard, I got in scruple. Because of that I had to engage a proffesional jazz player to test Bosie 214 and Becshtein B212 for me.I will tell you his recommendation later.

Since it seems to be that no one else whishes to guess the grands, her is the result: Grand 1= Boesendorfer 214, Grand 2= C.Bechstein B212, Grand 3=Shigeru Kawai 212 and Grand 4= Yamaha S6.So Dave, you are the winner and your choise was equal to mine. May be you want to come toNorway and record with the C.Bechstein on our SSL AWS 900+? You are welcone!

Her is what the jazz-player said; The Bosie sounds a little fractious, slight and not unsparing. It will not be a good grand in the studio. The Bechstein and Schimmel gives much more tone and gadget and should be easyer to work with as a sound technician. The Schimmel 230 would be very nice, but if you want prestige, it's the C.Bechstein that counts.